


In Happier Times

by Sera_Clay



Category: The Blacklist (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-01
Updated: 2016-09-18
Packaged: 2018-04-24 06:58:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4909714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sera_Clay/pseuds/Sera_Clay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lizzington, shorter pieces, fragments, various ratings. Will provide warnings as needed.<br/>Not my personally created characters or show, and not for profit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Scenes From The Farm

Early afternoon on the northern California coast, the fog not yet advancing, bright sunlight dancing off the sea and the grassy, rolling hills sere and dry in tones of yellow and silver and sienna.

Red steps from the delivery truck and walks confidently up onto the sagging porch and into the weathered farmhouse. The unpainted door is unlocked, as he expects, and he lets the screen door slam behind him as he listens to the truck drive away.

His half-brother Gerold's house. Red hasn't set foot in this room for more than twenty years, but he recognizes the pattern of the faded green linoleum.

Liz has been safe here, he's sure of that, but where is she?

Gerold Jr. has kept her occupied and protected, Red has no doubt about that, but he can't go wandering around the farm or the outbuildings to look for her. Not in broad daylight.

He passes through the kitchen, opens the closed doors at either end of the hall, ignoring the small bathroom in the center.

A masculine room at the front, piles of boots on the floor and a red plaid wool blanket on the bed. Tidy despite the paperbacks stacked high on the shelf beneath the window.

An office with a couch bed draped in quilts at the back, his brother's old oak desk weighted with piles of faded paper. No computer, and a brick of an old black phone. The bag he sent with Liz, just one change of clothing and a few toiletries, sits on the floor beside a number of plastic shopping bags.

Apparently she's been purchasing western wear?

Red didn't mean to leave her here for more than a few days, but things became complicated quickly. 

Closing the door, Red makes his way back to the kitchen and brews a fresh pot of coffee, finding the supplies in the same cupboards, his aunt's flatware in the same drawers. He takes off his overcoat and drapes it over the back of a chair, then sets his fedora on the kitchen table, where it sits looking decidedly out of place. He's so weary, his ribs are sore from a fight where Dembe would have beyond useful, and he needs to see her again. He needs to know she's still safe, and then he can rest.

***

The fair is small, and local, but crowded every day.

Elizabeth Keen, with her hair dyed in streaks of blond and red, wearing cat eye black framed glasses and sporting several fake tattoos and piercings, including a small silver hoop in one eyebrow, is having a wonderful time. 

"Gerry! Cotton candy!" She tugs at the strong, freckled hand she's holding. "Buy me some, please?"

Liz bats her eyelashes at him, and Gerold Reddington, Jr. laughs down at her from beneath his Stetson, his green eyes fond. He's no taller than his infamous uncle, but his narrow, hard-muscled shoulders are just as erect, and his ginger hair frames a similarly expressive face.

"Of course, darling, so long as you let me have a bite?"

She's been introduced around town as his ex-girlfriend from college, and has enjoyed watching several local woman cast new eyes at this unfamiliar new Gerry.

"A bite of what?" she responds, laughing back at him as they join the line at the booth, still holding hands.

Gerry was a little shy, almost tongue-tied, when she appeared on his doorstep at midnight with a sealed letter of introduction from Red.

Liz wishes he had allowed her to read that letter before burning it; she searched for it the next morning, while he was out doing chores, but found only some fresh ash near the stove. She often wonders what Red told Gerry about her.

He proceeded to behave in a completely normal and friendly manner the next morning, and has entered into their role play with great enthusiasm.

They are wearing matching plaid shirts today, and her boots are finally broken in sufficiently that they don't give her blisters.

He buys her a fluffy cone of pink cotton candy, and two more sealed bags to take home.

They feed each other bites as they make one last round through the games.

Liz could win anything she wants from the shooting gallery, but this is no place to display the skills that won her a marksman's medal. She commiserates with Gerry when he misses, and tugs him away. 

At least she won't need to cook tonight. Her skills are improving, but very slowly. So many of the recipes for Gerry's favorite foods begin and end with "My mother just went in the kitchen and cooked it."

They are singing along with the radio when he pulls the truck up to the house in the twilight.

They left the porch light on. The screen door is slightly ajar.

"Get to the barn, Gerry," Liz whispers, pulling her new pistol from under the front seat, then settling her nerves for an assault. "I'll let you know when it's clear."

"Hell, no," he whispers in protest, nevertheless sliding down low in his seat while leaving the engine running. He casts a glance up at his deer rifle in the rack.

"If you leave, they'll think we both went," she urges him. "They can't see anything with our headlights on the house."

For a second she wants to just drive away with him, flee into the night. She wants Red at her back. She would even take Ressler. Not this clean living farm boy, with his college dreams of a future turned to farming for lack of money after the illness and death of both his parents.

Then a familiar silhouette appears at the door, and Liz flips the safety back on.

Red.

He's come for her at last.

***

Gerry reaches for his companion's arm as she begins to open the door of his truck.

"Gerry, it's Red," she tells him. "Bring the bag in, will you?"

He shuts off the engine and sits watching her approach the house. She still has the pistol in one hand, as if expecting the possibility of a trap.

"Lizzie? Is that Gerold with you?"

"Yes, Red."

Apparently reassured, she tucks the pistol in the back of her skin tight jeans.

"Nice boots."

He opens the screen door and they stand staring at each other in the yellow glow of the porch light. Liz moves first, to catch him in a quick hug. Red's face contorts with pain as her arms come around him, unseen except by Gerry.

Gerry shuts off the truck lights and grabs the bag with their purchases. For a second, in the porch light, the man reminded him of his grandfather.

He doesn't know how he could have expected his uncle to remain the youthful officer he knew as a boy. Who is this heavyset, elegantly dressed man?

All he has is a letter, memorized, then burned, and a handful of treasured memories. And Lizzie, of course. This man entrusted Lizzie to him.

She's a wonderful woman, playful, hard working, and an excellent listener. He hasn't been lonely since she arrived.

***

Red ushers Liz into the house, trying not to stare at the changes she's made in her appearance.

She looks so much younger, and her face is tan and relaxed. Red could hear her singing country music with his nephew all the way up the gravel drive. His stomach is sour from too much cheap coffee.

"I see you've made yourself at home," he temporizes, ushering her into the kitchen, his eyes drinking in her slight form as she pulls out two mugs and starts preparing coffee for herself and the wary young man who at last follows her into the house, holding a creased paper sack.

"Yes, Gerry and I are very comfortable together." Her eyes laugh at him as she refills his mug. He takes it and sips, not wanting more coffee but unable to say no to her.

Red turns and holds out his hand.

Gerold Jr. looks enough like his half-brother that Red has to consciously remind himself they haven't seen each other for two decades. That this man was a boy when last they met.

"So you've come back."

The grip of his freckled hand is firm, his tone is not encouraging.

"Yes."

Red doesn't mean the word to come out that flat and cold, but he can't allow any confusion between them. Liz needs to come away with him. Not stay here.

The younger man's jaw tightens, but instead of responding, he reaches into the bag.

"Want a little more, Lizzie?" he says, waving a plastic bag at her without looking at Red again.

"Sure!"

Liz puts down her coffee and crosses the room, opening her mouth as Red watches in speechless outrage. 

"Here you go."

Gerold Jr. tears off a large pinch of cotton candy and feeds it to her, grinning as she rolls her eyes in pleasure. She licks her lips, and Red's eyes are drawn helplessly to the pink triangle of her tongue, her little outbreath of delight as she opens her mouth and begs for another bite.

"More, Gerry, give me another bite."

They are standing so close, so obviously comfortable together.

For a second Red wants to stomp out of the room, then his sense of humor takes over.

"Me too, Gerry, can't you tell I want a big bite of that, too?" he drawls.

The younger man's eyes widen, but Liz, thankfully, bursts into giggles.

"Of course, you can have a bite, Red," she tells him, plucking a generous amount of the fluffy candy from the bag and holding it out to him.

He hates cotton candy.

He licks her fingers as she feeds him, bite after bite, wordlessly staring at each other.

***

At last, Gerry retreats into the night to double-check the barn and the gates, and she's alone with Red.

"Are you hungry? I could cook you something?" she offers, not without pride at her new skills. 

Red shakes his head. He looks exhausted, and there's a hint of a bruise on his neck, barely visible above the collar of his customary starched dress shirt.

"It's past time for me to turn in," he says, looking around the kitchen as if expecting a bed to materialize.

The tiny front sitting room holds two recliners and a pair of elderly, high backed side chairs.

"You'll be in with me," Liz asserts, shutting off the coffee pot and putting the glass jug of cream back in the fridge. "Gerry snores."

"Oh?"

Liz turns and gives Red her most severe frown, trying not betray her delight at his sour tone.

"I can hear him all the way down the hallway, through a closed door."

"Ah."

Red collects his hat and follows her down the hallway and into her room, then looks around wearily. 

Liz touches his arm.

"There are clean towels in the bathroom cupboard. Why don't you take a shower?"

Listening to the water run, Liz tidies the room, then sits on the edge of the bed. Imagining Red naked in the shower, wishing she felt confident enough to join him in the big clawfoot tub.

He didn't invite her. She needs to allow him to set the pace, although that's not her style. She prefers to be in control. He probably does as well.

They've never shared a bed. It's a start. A start is more than she ever dreamed might be possible.

Red enters the room, wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist. Liz gasps at the extensive bruising visible at his neck and across his ribs. 

"Your turn," he says shortly, his mouth twisting as their eyes meet.

Liz blushes and nods, then hurries from the room. She probably smells like the fair, animals and beer and cheap fried food, so she takes the time to wash her hair and towel it dry. She loves the streaks of color, so different from the conservative look the FBI encouraged.

When she returns to the room in her robe, the lights are out, and Red is lying on the far side of the bed with his back to her.

She can barely make out the pattern of scars Cooper once described to her, but she's never seen. She tosses the robe on the desk and slides naked into bed.

"Good night, Lizzie."

His tone is firm, and he makes no further movement, even when she rolls from her back to her side, facing him. Liz listens to Red breathing, allowing her eyes to adjust to the darkness. There's a faint glow of moonlight through gap between the curtains.

"Red?"

"Yes, Lizzie?" His tone is anything but encouraging.

She was going to ask him for a kiss goodnight, but now she's once again afraid she'll be rejected.

They've only kissed once, the night he brought her here, and it was the lightest brush of his lips, intended for her cheek. 

"I'm glad you're back."

Her voice emerges small and unhappy. His breathing quickens, but he doesn't respond.

"Red?"

"Yes?"

"I'm going to move a little closer. Tell me if anything hurts."

Cautiously, she slides over until she can curl her body around his larger form. His skin is very warm and he smells soapy clean. She doesn't want to risk jostling his ribs, so she lays her top arm along his thigh, her face pressed to the base of his neck.

His leg is soft with hair, his skin warmer than she expected. He's so badly bruised that she can only hope he isn't starting to run a fever from some undiagnosed internal bleeding.

She runs her fingers over his knees, then up his thigh. Petting him as she cautiously explores this new flesh, this unanticipated opportunity. Thinking of how he licked at his lips, so sticky with cotton candy.

As her hand passes his hip, she splays her fingers, reaching for the loose curve of his belly.

"Lizzie. Sleep." Red catches her fingers in his and lifts them briefly to his lips, then tucks her hand, still enfolded in his, against his heart. She lies beside him and listens as his breathing slows, feeling his body settle into sleep in her embrace. Bruised and battered, far more extensively scarred than she ever imagined. 

Here beside her, and safe. It's enough, for now.


	2. 3.11 - The Missing Scene

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for episode 3.11. Very short. Lizzington. Somewhat OOC Red.

"You really want me to ...?" 

Liz broke off mid-sentence, striding about the fussy, over-decorated hotel suite as if she could somehow escape Red's request if she only walked fast enough.

"Yes, Lizzie."

She whirled and caught a grimace twisting his face before it smoothed to display his usual composure. 

"It was bad enough the last time, but now? Now?!?"

Liz stopped in front of the high-backed chair in which Red was sitting up very straight, his newest hat aligned precisely on the end table beside him. Her fists clenched, and for an instant she imagined smashing the crown of the fedora flat with a single blow.

How could he?

"If Tom Keen believes that your baby is his, then so will my enemies." He cleared his throat gently, looking up at her without blinking. "You know I wouldn't ask this of you, unless it was absolutely necessary to keep you both safe."

She wanted to strike him across the face; she wanted to collapse sobbing into his lap. Instead, Liz ground her teeth and continued her protests, knowing as the corners of his mouth turned down that they would eventually be futile.

"He disgusts me, Red. And when he thinks I'm falling for his fake protestations of love, he gives me such sly little smirks. Like I'm so stupid he can barely believe it."

Her face was hot with shame as Red gave a sad little shake of his head.

"Your pride is no reason to put our child at risk, Lizzie. You need to have sex with Tom Keen as soon as possible."


	3. The Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for 3:18. Lizzington. Fragment. Disclaimed.

The pressure, and then the pain.

Liz moved her aching head to the right, and the throbbing intensified, low in her gut.

Was she shot? Stabbed?

Suddenly everything came rushing back - the baby, the church, the accident. The hospital. The surgery.

Oh god, where was her daughter?

Liz forced her eyes open again the dim, yellow light of a table lamp at her bedside to find Mr. Kaplan, rocking in a high-backed cane rocker on the far side of the small room.

Where was she? Where was Agnes?

Her arms were trapped beneath the covers, but she needed to speak, to get out of bed. 

She needed to hold her baby. To know that Agnes was alive.

Liz strained to free her arms, but just as it dawned on her that she was strapped to the bed, unable to move, she felt the weight of Mr. Kaplan's eyes on her.

"Are you awake again, dearie?"

The older woman stood and moved to her side, then lifted a syringe from the bedside table.

No, no!

Liz shook her head from one side to the other, trying to force words from her mouth, as Mr. Kaplan leaned down and worked the shot into clear coil of the IV line that disappeared beneath the covers.

The pressure and the pain receded, then the room disappeared once more.

***

For the first day he slept. 

He paced through the first night, drinking and smoking.

The dawn was curiously gray.

Red observed his own reactions with as much detachment as he could manage, knowing as he did so the precipice on which he now stood.

Darkness where there should have been light, the fading of color from the world, and a curious, numb feeling, almost as if something essential had been lost or perhaps forgotten.

That constant awareness of loss, that nothing could ever be right again? He knew it so well.

And yet this was new, too, and deeper, as if his previous grief had dug deep channels that losing Liz now threatened to overflow.

Red drank cup after cup of black coffee, knowing as he did so that it could trigger the worst of symptoms.

Hallucinatory visions of his daughter alive and grown, or his lost loves resurrected.

A deadly, berserker rage.

Or a life-threatening collapse into fugue. Not eating, not drinking, all but immobile within the net of his memories.

Alcohol would be safer, or opium.

But he needed to stay alert. Dembe was sleeping at long last, and Red was on guard. All his surviving local teams were on outer perimeter guard. 

Or with Baz, escorting Agnes to her new home.

Red wanted her close, but the newborn's need for safety and security far outweighed his desire for comfort.

He didn't deserve comfort, in any case. Not ever.

His hands shook as he poured, sloshing hot coffee over the counter.

Why hadn't Kate called him from the morgue? Was she afraid he would break down over Lizzie's body? 

She had been so angry with him. He had never seen her like this before. Not since her daughter's death. A death he had also failed to prevent.

He deserved her silence, her anger, and worse.

***

Kate Kaplan folded her hands in her lap and rocked, staring at Elizabeth Keen's still white face without lingering on any one feature. Her long, dark lashes. The deepening circles beneath her closed eyes. The curve of her chin, determined even in her drugged sleep.

And how will you survive this time, old lady? she asked herself sarcastically in the privacy of her own mind, her features still composed and expressionless as fear and pride chased each other up and down her nerves.

She had beaten Raymond Reddington at his own game, for once. Had stolen this young women out of deadly peril and into the tranquility of her own private world, a world no criminal could penetrate.

Outside the heavily draped windows, doves called.

Dawn. Isabella would be arriving soon, with Agnes and Elle.

This would be her last favor from Baz. She would owe him, in future.

Kate shook her tired head as if to dismiss the thought.

Guaranteeing the safety of Elizabeth Keen and her child was all that mattered. She would deal with the resulting mess once that task was complete.

She rocked slowly, listening for the sound of the truck. Sleep, so long denied, would be possible soon.

***


	4. Lucifer in Starlight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for 3.18 and 3.19. Lizzington

He had done all that he could do, and it was ended.

All in vain.

Raymond Reddington laid his head back against the burnished black leather seat of yet another anonymous sedan, and allowed his eyes to fall closed against the swaying of the narrow city streets.

Lizzie.

He could still see her blue eyes, dark with pain and fear, her hand straining towards him.

The way her hair smelled, cold and lifeless, still lightly scented with the Parisian perfume he had given her so long ago.

He couldn't even rage that she had chosen to wear his gift for her wedding to another man.

Because her thoughts had been with him, on that last day.

The sedan drew even with an unpainted stoop, a dark green metal door.

"Will there be anything further, Mr. Reddington?"

Red gave a brief shake of his head, then tugged his fedora down lower over his eyes. His feet hurt despite his handmade shoes, and his chest ached constantly, tight with the tears he dared not shed.

He had broken once, twice, before, then put himself together with such painstaking effort, like the music box they had buried with Lizzie. His gift, and a burned toy, and a photo of Sam, all that her handwritten last will and testament had specified would go down into darkness with her.

Red pulled the heavy door open and squared his shoulders.

Kate Kaplan had insisted on this meeting before he left the country. His debt to Aram was paid; the FBI was still cataloging the bodies and associated evidence of criminal activity.

His jet would take him to Athens, where his yacht was already awaiting him. What he needed now was the ocean, not another painful farewell.

Security guards and nurses. No visible cameras.

"This way, sir."

An older woman in a neat gray dress and heels, heavily armed, gestured towards an unmarked, windowless door. One of ten identical steel doors on a long, soundproofed hall. His footsteps were slow and deliberate on the clean, faded linoleum that smelled of disinfectant, and below that, of blood and death.

Or perhaps he was imagining that? The whole world smelled like blood now, at times.

The operating room. Her bright blood turning dark.

He put his hand on the door handle and gritted his teeth before he pulled.

***

Liz clutched the bright blue lap blanket and watched as the door opened.

Watched as Raymond Reddington stepped into the room, scanning it without visible haste until his eyes settled on her chair, on the circle of light from the bedside lamp.

Their eyes met.

"No," he said, in a voice she had only ever heard once before. Begging, trembling after the King family auction. "No."

Then he turned his back to her and stared at the closed door, his hands hanging at his side, fists clenching and releasing.

Her eyes filled with tears, hot tears of shame. But he had to understand, he had to realize instantly, that what she had done was the only way to save Agnes. To save them all.

Liz swallowed hard, and waited.

She had imagined embraces, shouting, icy silence.

Not this rejection of her, of her very existence. 

At last he moved, placing one palm on the door, then leaning forward slightly as if testing before placing the other palm flat as well.

The brim of his hat must be almost touching the door, she thought irrelevantly, watching his broad shoulders beneath his exquisitely cut overcoat, identifying the faint outline of the weapon on his belt.

"Red?"

She swallowed again, waiting for her voice to register. Waiting for him to turn, to move.

To answer her. 

But there was no response. The silence lengthened between them, the dim, windowless room turning from cosy to cold as she sat in her new white robe, her new white slippers, noticing that the pale blue coverlet on her hospital bed was slightly askew, her clear plastic water jug smudged with fingerprints. 

She could push the call button and summon Kate.

Liz licked her lips and tried again.

"Red? Please?"

***

She wasn't real, he told himself fiercely, feeling the hot tears spilling soundlessly down his cheeks.

Whoever the woman was in that chair, she wasn't, she couldn't be his Lizzie.

Red couldn't bear any more pity. Not now. Not when he was so close to leaving for Greece.

Whatever Kate Kaplan needed of him would have to wait for another day.

"Please come here."

Red stared at his pale hands, wrinkles and freckles and age spots blurred by his tears, and willed his right hand to move towards the door handle.

Nothing. 

The cool metal beneath his palms seemed the only sensation holding him to reality.

"Please, Red. You're scaring me."

Whoever she was, she wasn't Kate. Nothing ever scared her enough to sound like that.

Red blinked hard, willing the tears to stop coming.

Lizzie's voice. How could he be hearing Lizzie's voice so perfectly?

Perhaps the chair was empty.

Perhaps this was Cape May, all over again?

Cautiously, he turned his head slightly to peer over his right shoulder.

***

Red's eyes, wide and fearful, glistened with the tears still streaking his cheeks. 

He was clean shaven, the dark circles beneath his eyes familiar, the downward tug at the corners of his mouth less so. His lips trembled and then parted, but no sound emerged.

"Please, Red, come here," she repeated, letting go of the lap blanket and turning her palms up slowly, reaching just slightly towards him as if approaching a frightened animal.

He just stared at her, mesmerized.

In return, Liz allowed her gaze to linger on the familiar curve of his ear below the dark brim of his hat, the loose flesh beneath his jaw, the way his nostrils flared, the corner of one eye narrowing even as his tears continued to well up.

She owed him her life. Her daughter's life.

His resources had kept them safe. His pain and grief had convinced their enemies of her death as nothing else could have done.

Kate Kaplan had urged her to simply disappear. To allow the lie to become truth. To live reborn under a new name.

She could have surrendered Agnes for adoption.

She could have watched Tom sail away into a new life.

She could have abandoned the Task Force, no longer an agent, no longer part of the agency she worked so hard to serve.

But Red? 

Liz had realized, with a crushing sense of guilt and regret at how long the revelation had required, that she couldn't leave Red.

Not without trying to somehow make things right. Things not even Kate Kaplan suspected.

"Please?" she coaxed him again, watching him bite at the inside of his mouth in indecision, his fluttering lashes dark with moisture. His skin was unnaturally pale, and she thought for a moment that he might collapse to the ground.

Then he made a sound, almost a grunt, nearly a sob, and bared his teeth for a moment before pushing himself away from the door and turning to stride towards her.

Swift, deadly, furious. Something fey, almost mad in his gaze.

Liz tipped her head up to hold his eyes as he approached. His pristine suit, his perfectly tied green silk tie. 

What could she say? 'I'm sorry' seemed hopelessly inadequate to his evident suffering.

"Red, I've missed you every day."

That stopped him in his tracks, rounding the hospital bed to stand before her chair.

***

He stared down at her, taking unwilling stock. 

Blue eyes and brown hair. 

Porcelain-pale skin and rosy lips.

Square shoulders thrust back, and small, strong hands.

Hands that were lifted towards him. Trembling slightly above the lap blanket that covered her belly and legs.

Pristine white slippers that matched her robe.

Was she even there?

"Lizzie?' he asked, hearing his own voice emerging rough and hoarse as if he had been sobbing for hours. 

Her brows tilted up, her smile brilliant.

"Yes, Red," she responded. Her hands still opened on her lap.

Suddenly, he didn't care if she was real. He didn't care if Kate found him in the depths of madness. If the nurses carted him away and sedated him.

Because she was sitting before him now, welcoming his visit. Welcoming his touch.

"Lizzie," he said again, the word barely making it past another sob as his eyes began to flow once again.

Red dropped to his knees in front of her, buried his face in her lap, and wept.

***

He clutched first at her thighs, then her waist, his hands knotting in the soft cotton of her robe, then feeling again and again for her flesh beneath the layers of fabric.

"Lizzie, Lizzie," he repeated at intervals, "I'm so sorry."

Liz lifted off the fedora and tossed it, one handed, onto her bed then leaned down to press kisses onto the crown of Red's head, caressing his face, hair, and neck with her hands. 

"Oh, Red."

His skin was smooth and well-tended, the silvery stubble of his hair soft beneath her touch, the exposed skin of his bare scalp softer still. She kissed it again and again, feeling the curve of his skull beneath, feeling the answering softness of his lips at her wrists as he turned his head from one side to the other, his tongue tracing the inside of her forearms with kisses and little nips.

His wicked, tender mouth, that knew her like no other lover. That turned her inside out with joy, and gave her back to herself, whole and proud and courageous once again.

Since that one night on the container ship, she had thought of little else. 

Her plan to marry Tom and raise Agnes as his child, like her previous plan for an open adoption, had been always and only to protect Red. 

She had been such a fool.

"Oh, Lizzie," he repeated, rubbing his wet face against her as if ensuring himself that she was real. "Oh, Lizzie."

"Oh, Red."

She was done with plans. 

Whereever Red was going next, whatever his future held, she and Agnes would be a part of it. For as long as they might have together, she would never leave him again.


	5. Deceit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lizzington, spoilers for Season 3 finale. Hopefully not AU.

"I do adore you, Lizzie, but you must realize we can never risk doing that again?"

"We'll see about that, Raymond."

Their gazes locked, Raymond Reddington and Elizabeth Keen sat closer than usual in the small booth at the roadside restaurant, dissecting the previous night on the ship. 

"The risk is just too great."

"Your enemies already know that I'm important to you. That I matter."

Red shook his head.

"Not like this. You can't possibly imagine how much more dangerous your life could become."

Liz gave a startled half-laugh.

"Like yours? Is that what you mean?"

"Elizabeth. Darling." He met her eyes at last, desolation lurking behind his customary smile, and she almost kissed him, right there in the light of day. "No."

Liz raised her brows.

"I'll make you change your mind about that someday," she responded, leaning close enough that she could feel the warmth of his breath, sense the uptick in his pulse as his detachment began to bleed away into unwilling desire. "Raymond. Darling. Yes."

***  
In the drugstore bathroom, stall door firmly latched, Liz peered down at the plastic indicator and fought the urge to shake it frantically.

To produce a different result.

Since returning to Iowa, she had longed for Red's love, his embraces, even an occasional passionate kiss, in vain. He had been steadfast in his misguided notion that pursuing a relationship would place her in even greater danger.

If there was one emotion she could never bear, it was pity.

She would not allow him to come to her only for the sake of their child. For anything less than a free and willing choice to be her lover, her partner, her husband.

Liz had offered herself to Red so many times and been refused, but she had believed she was getting through to him. That she had all the time in the world to wear down his scruples and reverse his self-sacrificing decision.

That time was suddenly gone.

She needed to find a way to deflect Red's attention. To protect herself, and her child, until she could decide what to do next.

Tom.

He was the only other man she had ever slept with, apart from Nik, and Red knew she would never return to that cowardly physician.

Tom.

Her former husband was a perfect choice. Because Red had been concerned that they would need to split up while on the run, Liz easily had access to sufficient funds to pay Tom to pretend to love her, sleep with her, even marry her.

Once they were safe, far from Red's influence, she could pay him off and rebuild her life as a single parent.

***

She was pale and cool, her delicate flesh soon to turn waxy and stiff.

Red pressed kisses to her hand, to her forehead, to her face.

He couldn't bear to kiss her lips, though - to remember them as anything less than swollen with kisses, upturned in joyous laughter at how well their dissimilar bodies fit together.

"Oh yes, Red, yes, perfect. That's perfect. So good."

They had loved, and paused to hold each other close, then embraced again and again throughout the night.

Why had he pushed her away?

In what madness had he denied them both the comfort and passion that could have been theirs before this day?

Rebuffed, she had turned to Tom Keen, and his love had gotten her pregnant, then killed as surely as if he had placed a gun to her precious head once again.

Or was this truly Red's own fault?

Would she not have been at least marginally safer at his side?

Tom had gone to his wedding unarmed.

Red rarely left his home without several deadly weapons.

But what use were they, what use was he anymore, if he couldn't keep her safe?

***

A villa in Cuba, light and airy with new furnishings in pastel tones and a tranquil view of the sea. Perfect for raising a baby, for giving the impression of rekindling a romance.

Why did she long for the snow and slush of DC, the echoing, dusty cement of the Post Office, the new leather scent of the back of Red's endless parade of black sedans?

"I think that's enough." Tom's harsh words were in sharp contrast to his doting expression as they sat together in the window seat, Agnes snuggled into her arms as if she had never been separated from her.

"Just a minute or two more," Liz hissed, trying not to move her lips. There were government spies everywhere, and she and Tom already spent too much time apart. The elderly gentleman on the beach with a spotting scope was certainly not bird watching.

"Pretend the kid is sick. I've got 500 pesos on a cockfight this afternoon."

Liz narrowed her eyes at Tom. 

"That's disgusting. I'm not going to go."

Tom widened his eyes at her in response and for a second she caught a glimpse of true hatred.

"I didn't invite you. Stay here with the kid or leave her with the maid. I don't care."

No, he really didn't.

Liz had been confused by Tom's complete rejection of Agnes, although he had certainly managed to play the attentive new father to perfection, until he finally confessed that he had happily undergone a vasectomy at age 18. 

"I deserve an afternoon off, boss," he sneered, still smiling in a disconcertingly adoring fashion at her when she failed to respond.

How had she ever fallen for him, with his bulbous eyes and hairy feet and the telltale, metallic taste of hatred flooding her mouth every time he tried to manipulate her?

Thank god for Red, that she had finally experienced real love, however briefly.

"Go," she responded, widening her mouth into a grimace that she hoped resembled a loving grin. "Go. I'll see you tomorrow."

But the next morning, she woke to find herself captured by Alexander Kirk. 

And Agnes, and presumably Tom, were long gone.

***


	6. The Invisible Road

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lizzington. Post Season Three, with spoilers. Fragment. My best take on explaining Lizzie up to this point.

Excerpt from "The Bus to Alliston, Ontario" by Margaret Atwood 

Outside, the moon is fossil  
white, the sky cold purple, the stars  
steely and hard; when there are trees they are dried  
coral; the snow  
is an unbroken spacelit  
desert through which we make  
our ordinary voyage;  
those who hear voices and those  
who do not, moving together, warm  
and for the moment safe,  
along the invisible road towards home.

 

Would she ever have a true home again?

Her bruised face concealed by the heavy black hood of her parka, Elizabeth Keen stared out the window of the Greyhound bus, her daughter Agnes bundled against the cold in her lap, the diaper bag at her feet keeping her toes, in their thin leather boots, both warm and cramped.

A home that she could always return to? One that she could always remember?

She understood why she had trusted Mr. Kaplan, even Nik, to help her escape from Red. But why had she, they, ever involved Tom Keen?

Agnes whimpered in her lap, and she resisted the urge to reach into her purse for her notebook, the latest in a series of more than a hundred small, spiral bound pads containing notes in three different types of handwriting.

Her own neat printing, in pencil or black ink.

The big cursive loops Liz favored, generally red or purple.

And the elegant, slanting script that vaguely resembled old copperplate that only Lizzie used, in flowing blue fountain pen.

Only Liz liked or trusted Tom. But Alexander Kirk had beaten her into hiding, at least for the present.

Elizabeth needed to get herself and Agnes to safety before Lizzie emerged and made a rash decision they would all eventually regret.

Like calling Raymond Reddington.

Who would never forgive her. Never understand.

They needed somewhere remote. Peaceful. Off the grid.

"Here." Sam stabbed his finger down on the faded old topo map, his finger landing just beside a deep crease. "You won't forget now, will you, Butterball?"

"I won't forget," she promised, rolling her eyes at yet another parental instruction. She was only moving away to attend college, not facing the end of modern civilization.

"This road, then the second gate, then a sharp right up this hill."

If Sam's directions were still accurate, still sufficient, Elizabeth knew just the place they could hide and recoup.

***

Lizzie woke, as she always did, to the scent of fire.

Burning! She had to escape!

Yet even as her eyes flew wide in terror, her memory returned once again.

Just the past, like everything that defined her. 

Lizzie forced herself to look around carefully, taking in every detail in her best approximation of profiler Elizabeth.

A sagging bed heaped with plaid blankets, almost filling a square, pine-paneled room. Dark curtains shut out all but a faint strip of the yellow morning light, and the varnished pine door was closed. 

Was she alone here?

A cry from the foot of the bed answered that question.

Agnes.

Lizzie pushed back the covers and crawled down the bed to peer at her baby. Lying on her back in a wooden crate padded with blankets, Agnes was waving her small hands and making low, uncertain sounds.

Her eyes widened when she saw Lizzie, and her lips curled up into an open-mouthed smile.

Lizzie beamed down at her.

"Ag-nes" she enunciated happily. "Ag-nes. Good mor-ning!"

Agnes just burbled at her, her hands grasping the air.

How she loved this child, the child she had never thought she would dare to choose.

Because what kind of a mother could she be, torn and fractured, forever in flux?

And yet somehow they were making it work, using not only the notebooks that had always bound them together, providing the clues to those other, unknown lives, but also, without words, Agnes herself, who had begun to knit them into healing.

Lizzie could remember watching Agnes sleeping in her crib in Cuba through Liz' eyes, not her own.

She could also remember receiving her baby from Tom's arms as Elizabeth on the day he arrived. Trying her best to feign affection as she calculated their next steps. The weight of Agnes, solid and healthy, yet ultimately so vulnerable.

Lizzie trailed one finger along her baby's cheek, remembering the touch of Red's skin, the brandy taste of his frantic mouth.

She knew she should not have taken advantage of their isolation, the many drinks, his unexpected sentimentality. But she had thought they were bound for a slower life in Spain. A chance to grow closer.

Perhaps even the opportunity to confess exactly what sort of monster he had unwittingly chosen to harbor.

Beth seldom emerged completely any more. She scorned their notebooks, their efforts to remember. But her deadly skills were always available.

Lizzie wound one of Agnes' new curls around her forefinger. They needed to stay well-hidden. 

After that first crop of straight, dark, newborn hair, her baby's curls were growing in much lighter.

Not just blonde, like Lizzie's own baby hair.

A pale, but unmistakable, red.

***

Raymond Reddington was seldom nervous, rarely found himself conversationally wrong-footed.

But there was a strange glint in Kate Kaplan's eyes that told him she was hiding something from him.

As if in answer, she squeezed them shut. Waited for his judgment.

Not defiant, but somehow resigned, without surrendering or begging for mercy. As if whatever he did with her, killed or spared her, had no power to touch her.

That wasn't the way this sort of confrontation should feel.

He was missing something. Something important.

"Tell me again why you decided to do this," he whispered. "Tell me the whole story again. Slowly."

She swallowed, but didn't open her eyes.

"You know why, Raymond," she answered him. "I did it for that poor girl. And for Agnes."

Why did she insist on calling Elizabeth Keen a "poor girl"?

What did Kate Kaplan know, that he didn't?

Now that was a question worth answering.

***

Ignoring her baby's wails from the foot of the bed, Liz buried her face in the flat, musty pillow and sobbed.

How had she been such a fool?

Reddington had warned, her hadn't he?

Red. 

He had not just warned her numerous times, he had actually begged her, implored her, not to marry Tom. The rare tears standing in his mournful eyes had briefly brought Lizzie to the surface, and Liz had barely managed to regain control.

And now, instead of awakening to a loving groom and a charming foreign beach, she was alone with Agnes in an off-grid cabin.

"Wahhhhhhhhhhhh!"

Agnes raised her voice and screamed, and Liz forced herself to stop weeping long enough to collect her red-faced baby and hold her against her bare shoulder.

Food. 

Agnes needed a bottle, and Liz needed coffee and something light. Something that wouldn't further knot her stomach, cramped with sobbing so hard she felt brittle. The opposite of a patient, loving mother.

Yesterday had been a good day, based on Lizzie's notes.

Why couldn't she or Elizabeth handle the next few days, even the next few weeks, without her?

Because you all promised, Liz reminded herself, collecting the current notebook from the knotty pine nightstand before carrying Agnes into the kitchen. Even Beth.

It was time to grow closer, to release their differences and focus on Agnes.

On keeping Agnes safe.

And that required one mother, not four.


End file.
